Iran building a bomb after all

US intel links Iran with nuke bomb bid By GEORGE JAHN, Associated Press Writer
Thu Feb 14, 2:50 PM ET



VIENNA, Austria - The U.S. has shared new intelligence with the International Atomic Energy Agency that it claims is evidence Iran was trying to make a nuclear weapon, diplomats said Thursday.

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One of the diplomats said Washington also gave the IAEA permission to confront Iran with at least some of the information in an attempt to pry details out of the Islamic republic as part of the U.N. nuclear watchdog's attempts to investigate Iran's suspicious nuclear past.

The diplomats suggested that such moves by the U.S. administration would be a reflection of Washington's' drive to pressure Iran into acknowledging that it had focused part of its nuclear efforts toward developing a weapons program.

The U.S. is leading the push for a third set of U.N. sanctions against Iran. Tehran insists its program is intended only to produce energy and has refused U.N. demands that it suspend its uranium enrichment program — technology that can produce both fuel for nuclear reactors and the fissile material for a bomb.

A recent U.S. intelligence assessment that Iran had a clandestine weapons program but stopped working on it four years ago has hurt Washington's attempts to have the U.N. Security Council impose a third set of sanctions.

While the Americans have previously declassified and then forwarded intelligence to the IAEA to help its investigations, they do so on a selective basis.

Following Israel's bombing of a Syrian site late last year, and media reports citing unidentified U.S. officials as saying the target was a nuclear installation, IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei turned in vain to the U.S. in asking for details on what was struck, said a diplomat who — like others — spoke on condition of anonymity in exchange for divulging confidential information.

Over the past two years, the U.S. already has shared material on a laptop computer reportedly smuggled out of Iran. In 2005, U.S. intelligence assessed that information as indicating that Tehran had been working on details of nuclear weapons, including missile trajectories and ideal altitudes for exploding warheads.